Opinion: Tax reform is at the finish line

by Boris Epshteyn, Chief Political Analyst

(Sinclair Broadcast Group)

EDITOR'S NOTE: Boris Epshteyn formerly served as a Senior Advisor to the Trump Campaign and served in the White House as Special Assistant to The President and Assistant Communications Director for Surrogate Operations.

WASHINGTON (Sinclair Broadcast Group) - We are getting closer and closer to tax reform. What are some of the key points in the compromised version of the tax bill that will be up for a vote in the House and the Senate? Let’s take a look.

The proposed corporate tax rate is 21 percent. It is currently 35 percent in our country, the highest of any advanced economy in the world. The original House and Senate versions proposed a 20 percent corporate tax rate. The change of the corporate rate from 20 to 21 percent is absolutely worth it to American businesses.

That is especially the case if it means that that they will be paying less starting in 2018 instead of 2019, as the Senate version was originally written.

The tax bill passed by the House got rid of deductions for student loan interest. That was criticized as unfairly burdening Americans either in college, in grad school or still paying off their loans. That deduction for student loan interest is present in the latest version of the tax bill.

Another compromise is to allow Americans to write off up to $10,000 in either state and local income or property taxes.

Here is the bottom line: it is impressive at how fast our elected officials are working through the maze of tax reform. The negotiations we are witnessing are exactly what has to happen for a bill to become a law in our system of government. Big picture, these changes make perfect sense as long as they result in the overhaul of our tax code.